I founded Endpoint Technologies Associates, Inc., an independent technology market intelligence company, in 2005. Previously, I was vice president of Client Computing at IDC, covering client PCs (desktop and mobile computers). Before that, I ran my own research and analysis firm, directed operations for a developer of multilingual text processing software, ran a technology analysis and publishing practice for a consulting company, managed international accounts for a data communications equipment manufacturer, and did new product development for a computerized trading network. I have published in a variety of forums and been quoted in a number of publications and other media outlets. I snagged a B.F.A. from Bennington College and an MBA from the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business. I am multilingual, world-traveled, and have bicycled over the Alps, but am now a family man.
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Dell Enterprise One Year Later

Dell now offers a full line of public, private, and managed cloud services along with traditional datacenter infrastructure and hybrids

A few days ago, Dell gathered technology industry analysts for its annual confab down in Austin. We flew in from all over.

It was old home week for many of us, former and current colleagues, a lot of back slapping, and a few cocktails.

The question on everyone’s mind was essentially this: so, a year hence, after you announced or rather re-emphasized your commitment to transforming Dell from an outfit that bangs boxes together into a first-tier enterprise supplier — a provider of “converged cloud” solutions, as the current jargon has it — how is it going?

The company was relentlessly on message. At one point, in plenary session, one of the analysts noted, in lieu of a question, that management should be complimented on its unity of tone.

All this careful craftsmanship had but one goal: to convince us that Dell is serious about this repositioning business.

In contrast to the old days, when at least some portion of every meeting of this sort was devoted to product highlights, demos, and roadmaps, over a day and a half, there was almost no discussion of products. Jeff Clarke, Vice Chairman and long-time aide-de-camp of Michael Dell, almost offhandedly answered an inquiry by saying, yes, there will be tablets, when Microsoft releases Windows 8, and yes, there will be more phones, time and place of our choosing.

Citing industry research, no doubt coming from one or more of the firms in the audience, Clarke noted that one-third of the workforce is now mobile, half of all endpoints sold in the world will be smart phones or tablets in 2015, and most users now have two to three devices. He said the company intends to “increase tablet and smart phone prominence and product mix,” promising that we “will see rich a portfolio of phones, built for business.”

That was it on boxes. Of PCs? Nary a whisper.

Oh, at one point the leaders of four practices — servers, storage, networking, and software — actually got up and stuck their modules into an M1000 blade chassis, just to show that they really could build a modular, converged system. Well, actually, Praveen Asthana, VP of Enterprise Strategy and Marketing and software spokesman of the moment, just held up a USB key for the audience to see and said it contained the 100,000 lines of code that glue the hardware elements together. He didn’t actually load it in our presence. But the point was taken. These guys have an increasingly full set of solutions, and it’s not just imaginary.

The rest of the time was devoted to establishing, step by step, proof points that demonstrated the progress the company is making toward becoming a full-line enterprise supplier.

As in any situation in which a vendor is asserting some capability, the best spokespeople are its customers. Steve Felice, President and Chief Commercial Officer (you don’t think these “C” titles are getting a bit out of hand?) ran a panel which featured a well-funded startup, a quirky content creation company, and a well-established services company that works with non-profits.

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